We have thus far seen a number of ancient books, now published, that were not included in the Bible by the Catholic Church. Should they have been?

By all appearances, these were extant in those early days. Yet the Church may not have had access to them, seeing as how they were hidden away.

Still, during the long process of canonizing today’s scriptures, a number of books were included, then excluded, including, I believe, the Book of Enoch.

As it stands, we’ll have to make up own minds about whether these missing books constitute real scripture. However, the fact that the Qumran’s Book of Isaiah matches the Bible’s Book of Isaiah almost word for word lends credence to the rest of the Dead Sea Scrolls as being authentic. It will be interesting to read the lead books once they get translated.(more…)